Circling the wagons won't work.
on
Giant Sucking Noise
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
If there is someone out there who can do exactly what I do only cheaper, who am I to complain if a customer or employer chooses them?
My job is to insure that I can provide more value than the competition. This means that I have to do something that they cannot or I have to do something that they can do only better, meaning that I have to do it faster, cheaper, or with better quality.
That's just how it works folks. Deal with it and get cracking.
Are those of us not willing to spend 400 bucks on a new vid card (or for those of us stuck with a 4x AGP board, that plus a new mobo) going to have to turn 90% of the features off to run it at a good looking frame rate?
Probably, but only for about 6 months until that $400 video card turns into a $200 video card and the Mobo becomes the $99 special.
The sad thing is that this 1040 mile fiber link to the South Pole will probably be more reliable than the DSL link to my house.
Of course what can I expect for $50/month.
What do you most want to get your hands on?
on
Ask Kevin Mitnick
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
A lot has changed over the last 8 years. While you haven't been able to use computers or the Internet, I'm sure that you have been able to keep up with books and other reading.
I'm sure that there is something new that you just can't wait to get your hands on. What is it and why?
I know that the logical question is "should we?" There are bound to be some consequences that we don't understand but what better way to try to understand than to experiment?
If we proceed carefully, I think that it is unlikely that we will cause any disturbances that are more catastrophic than a volcanic eruption or other large natural event. The world always seems to recover from these events.
If we do gain more understanding and are able to tune our weather the benefits could be enormous. Imagine steering hurricanes away from population centers or directing a little rain to an area that needs it or directing it away from an area that is already flooding.
You have to pick industries and companies that are making money. While some sectors have been hit pretty hard, others are still doing ok. The slowdown also seems to be pretty regional so you may have to do a little travelling.
I have customers in several industries. I have a few that are cutting back and others that are still doing well. One of my better customers even went out of business last December. Having a diverse base helps me even things out. I simply do more work for the customers that have money right now.
I also tend to do work for large companies. Giving me a $20k PO to handle a few things isn't that big of a deal when they have a $100+ million annual project budget. Get a few of those PO's going and you are doing ok.
There are two cases where you will be hired. (1) They need to get something done quickly. Their staff could do it but there just isn't enough to go around. They need some extra help temporarily. (2) You can do something that their staff cannot. You really have to work hard to develop your skills.
I keep in touch with a lot of people and keep up with what they have going on and what they plan to do in the coming year. I'll keep up with them. I call to see if everything is going OK. Sometimes I'll get some business when they fall behind. Sometimes something comes up and they remember me because I have called in the last couple of months and they call to see if I can handle it. Sometimes they budget money for me to do future projects. It takes a while to get a pipeline going but once it does then you can keep steady work coming up and you have diversified your income so one sector or region slowing down doesn't wipe you out. Think of it as income redundancy and load balancing. It takes more to setup and manage but hey, downtime is expensive.
I guess my main point after seeing the article is that it is not all doom and gloom out there. If you are willing to take charge of things and do everything possible to insure that you can connect your services with a willing customer then you will do OK. The US economy is going faster than Europe's or Japan's. Things are not bad all over. There are down spots and up spots. If you are in a down spot then you can try to find an up spot our you can sit in your trough and hope that it perks back up eventually. I've just never been the type to sit and wait.
It can be overwhelming. It takes years to develop a good network and get your name out in your niche.
One thing to consider is that they may not be able to hire you as an employee right now but they may be able to hire you to do specific jobs. Set yourself up as a sole proprietor and make up a company. Get your city, county, state licenses as applicable and you are in business. It really doesn't need to be that big of a deal.
As you work for people, opportunities will arise. You may be offered a permanent position or you may decide that you like doing your own thing. If it pans out then you can incorporate into an S-corp or an LLC. Most people are really intimidated by the whole thing but it isn't that big of a deal. You do need an accountant to help you set up your books and help you learn the legal ropes.
The more flexible and dynamic that you can be, the better off you will be in the long run. The goal is to make it easy on the person hiring you. They should be confident that you will take care of the problem and make them look good.
I'm not saying that it is easy and it certainly takes a lot of guts to stick your butt out there the first time but like everything else, it gets easier with practice.
I'm a freelance engineer so I tend to be unemployed all of the time (everytime I finish a project). As such, I don't tend to be too sympathetic to unemployment sob stories.
Most companies are just starving for good talent. They have complex systems that they don't understand and business problems that must be solved. It is very difficult to find good people. If you can help then they are all over you.
There is all this opportunity out there but you have to find it or it has to find you. You have to network. Most technical types don't like this but you have to spend time developing the network and keeping in touch with people. By keeping in touch with people, they will think of you when they need problems solved. You also get a good idea of what people need and you can try to tailor your talents to the market's needs.
Stay flexible and be willing to take on things outside of your core abilities. You have to get in over your head every once in a while to learn. The more you do, the more you can do. It is a self perpetuating cycle.
If you are a young engineer or are in school, don't despair. Its not all doom and gloom out there. There will always be opportunity out there. You just have to work to find it.
The Bush administration introduced a resolution to the UN Security Council to limit access to Pringles cans and other dual-use technologies.
John Poindexter demonstrated the usefulness of his new All Watchful Eye database. By querying the database, he was able to instantly produce a list of all Iraqi's who have purchased Pringles in the last year:
"SELECT LASTNAME, FIRSTNAME FROM LISTOFEVERYONEANDEVERYTHING WHERE NATIONALITY = 'IRAQI' AND PURCHASE LIKE 'PRINLGLE'"
Tariq Aziz refuted claims that the evil Iraqi dictator starved his people to funnel money made from UN sanctioned oil sales to his weapons development by producing pictures of well fed Iraqi children being forced to eat Pringles.
Sean Penn who was previously reported to be in Iraq to protest war was actually found to be drawn to the country by a powerful case of the munchies. When confronted with this allegation, Penn responded that it was "totally bogus" and told the reporter to "stop being such a dick, dude". He then offered to help an Iraqi technician with his Pringle can claiming that his dad was a TV repairman and had an "awesome set of tools".
Suggestion for Saddam
on
DOD vs. 802.11b
·
· Score: 3, Funny
They saved me from low bandwidth hell a couple of years ago. They were the first to offer broadband service to my house.
$50/month with a static IP address. Hughes spent some money when they bought Telocity. When I first got the service (Telocity days) there were a lot of dropped packets and a few problems but it was better than nothing. Over the last year, it has been great. Never goes down, fast transfers.
I guess I need to go find a new provider now. Good luck finding a static IP for $50/month. At least I write off the service as a business expense so Uncle Sam takes part of the hit as well. Serves them right for their dipshit telecom policies.
A former employer of mine had several customer billing applications running on big iron. The systems have worked for years but they wanted to be more nimble and offer more flexible billing options, etc. Newer systems would offer more flexibility.
The old systems have been around for ages. The original programers are long gone. Over the years, the business logic has become very complex and there are old artifacts in there from changes that have been made and remade. Reverse engineering all of this and deciding what is needed and what is not is not a trivial task.
In short, four years later the system is still doing the billing. Migrating to another system is going to be very costly and very error prone. It will happen eventually but not until running the old system is no longer an option. That may be a very long time. There are so many of these old systems around that there is still profit to be made in keeping them going.
Don't worry, you'll be giving that $300 back to the government this year. It was just an advance, you do owe it back on your taxes this year.
I got my check, indorsed it, deposited it, and then mailed the money back in for my quarterly tax payment. I did go out and make more money to help stimulate the economy because I'm a patriotic kind of guy.
640KB should be enough for anyone
on
AMD's 64-bit Plot
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
At first they will be expensive, then they will be in the $599 desktops. Why wouldn't you use them?
It looks like the fsmlabs product has come a long way. It is really great that they make it available for free. I think that this approach has several advantages over the Steeplechase system in that you can probably do a lot more with the RTOS. The Steeplechase RTOS was limited.
Unfortunately, Steeplechase didn't make any money. There were licensing costs with the Radisys kernel and most professional controls folks were afraid for PC based control. I have to admit that I would probably limit my exposure to things like data acquisition and small controls projects. Many of the things that I work on tend to go boom or release dangerous chemicals when they fail.
The last thing that I used Steeplechase for was NASA's Payload Ground Handling Mechanism that loads payloads into the space shuttle. We used Steeplchase as a watchdog over the motion controllers. It compared operator input to the motion of the gantry and hit the kill switch if the motion controller seemed to be out of control. It worked very well in that application.
As far as cost, Steeplechase was competitive. It cost about the same to buy the I/O and software as it did to purchase a PLC.
I've done some work with Steeplechase. It worked very well. The RTOS was totally memory resident and based on the RADISYS kernel. Once it loaded, you can disconnect the hard disk and it will keep running. This increased reliability. Keep in mind that Windows would crash but the RTOS monitored it. You could program the control system to continue operation or perform an orderly shutdown in that event.
There is a software product called Steeplechase that is used for PC based control. It loads a Real Time OS first. This handles all of the control application. Windows NT/2000 is then run as a low priority process of the RTOS. It allows the control application to respond to real time constraints and products the control application from a Windows crash.
I believe that one of the Linux RTOS solutions uses a very similar approach.
I also believe that this is how the VMware GSX server product works.
Schedule, contacts, email, web, notes, time accounting, tasks, and e-books. I couldn't live without it. I'm on the road a lot and it means that I am never out of touch. It turns all of those little 5-10 minute waits during the day into productive time. Catch up on email, news, stock quotes, etc.
I also categorize my contacts. Before I visit a site, I review the names of everyone there. That way I always remember everyone's names.
My contact list has been electronic for about 7 years now. I've got thousand of entries. Even if someone's information isn't totally up to date, it has helped me many times. Last week a name came up that sounded familiar but I couldn't place it. Did a search and found that I bought some instrumentation from him in '96.
I also love the task list. As things pop up, I put them on the stack. Once you get in the habit, you don't forget to go back and take care of little details. It's nice to pull up a project and see that you have 10 outstanding items that you need to tackle.
The overall package is a lot bulkier than I would prefer and the battery life on the CDPD modem could be better but it is so useful that I put up with it. I also crave a much faster wireless connection. I have an 802.11 card that I use at home. That kind of speed everywhere and I would be in heaven.
Syncing hasn't been a problem and the Jornada has been rock solid reliable.
I would love to have a PDA with all of the capabilities that I currently have but in a Palm V form factor (with a higher res screen). I'm waiting for bluetooth PDA's and phones. I could axe the CDPD modem and just use the cell phone in my pocket. Probably next year.
One trend that this does not take into account is many families have more than one computer. How many Dad's have upgraded so that their kids could use the old computer?
I think that manufacturers saw a big surge in purchasing as many homes bought computers for the first time. Y2K was also a big reason to upgrade PC's. Now I think that most people have a PC that meets their needs with no reason to upgrade for functional reasons. The main reason to buy a computer is not to replace the old one but to have another computer in the house/office.
The only appealing use of this that I can think of right now might be to load a movie or two on the laptop prior to a plane flight.
I was hoping that this may allow you to burn a DVD or VCD from the downloaded site but no such luck. I can't think of any time that I would sit and watch a movie on my PC except when travelling.
I can't quite see how they expect to make any money off of this. To be competitive this services has to offer something better than the existing distribution channels. I see far too many bad points and only one good, no returns or late fees.
That helps but IE will insert the http://wwww and.com to anything. Thus if I type cnn and hit cntrl+enter, it will put http://www.cnn.com on the address line and bring up CNN. It is fast and I've grown pretty used to it.
I've grown used to typing 'google' and hitting ctrl + enter and having the http://www. and.com added automatically. I really miss it when using Mozilla. Is there a comparable function?
I've been pretty turned off by some of the sales practices that I have seen by large software companies. I think that it makes much more sense for governments to pool their resources and develop free software instead of licensing commercial packages.
MS licensing fees are not unreasonable but they do add up when you are talking about so many users. At least I haven't seen them selling 2 licenses for every govt employee.
A couple of years ago, an Oracle reseller sold the state of CA more licenses than they had users to use. I've seen it happen with other software companies. I'd love to see CA move to an open source database and tell Oracle to kiss their butts. It would serve them right.
The complaining party, the Interactive Digital Software Association
("IDSA"), specifically requests that you immediately cease and desist
in the
distribution of copyrighted software. In addition, please inform the
Abuse
Department of (my ISP) in writing, that the alleged
activity
has ceased.
I think that everyone needs to realize that when you fire up a gnutella client, you are broadcasting what you have on your computer and the files that you are sharing for all to see. It doesn't take much coding to start logging who is sharing content that you own. It also doesn't take long to cross reference the IP address and find out who owns those addresses.
If you are sharing files on a gnutella client you can expect to get a cease and desist email from your ISP eventually. Many ISP's are receiving notifications from contents owners on a weekly basis. Sharing files on gnutella violates virtually every usage agreement that I have ever seen. Although the ISP's don't want to loose customers, they don't want to take the heat for being unresponsive.
I don't think that the Copyright holders are going to change their minds anytime soon. Right now it is probably much cheaper for them to hire a few coders and a few lawyers and start scaring people than it is to try to develop new business models.
I think that things will slowly change. There are already people out there trying out new business models. Some artists are also into it. Eventually someone will figure out a reliable way to make money and artists will eventually follow. I think that it is going to take years though. The establishment has things locked down pretty tight.
More choice now than our parents had
on
Generation Wrecked
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
I have to admit that things look pretty bad right now but I am still optimistic. Life is hard, no doubt about it. You have to work your ass off and every strategy that you try is not going to be successful but I'm not willing to give up just yet.
The recession in '92 taught me some valuable lessons and this latest bust has reinforced those lessons and validated my strategies. I'm glad that these events happened while I am still relatively young.
1. Work for a company that is making money (as an employee or a businessman). If the company is not making money, find one that is. Don't wait, it will only get worse. 2. If the company isn't making money and your department isn't making the company money, your days are numbered. Get out. 3. Live lean. Keep your fixed expenses as low as possible. 4. Avoid debt at all cost for non-appreciating assets. If it is going to be worth less after you buy it, then pay cash. If you can't pay cash then do without it. 5. Use credit cards for convenience only and always pay them off every month. 6. Keep a war chest. You must have 1 year's expenses in cash if you are going to have any options in a pinch. There is nothing worse than having all of your options limited because you need a paycheck in 2 weeks to cover your rent. 7. When times are good, save your money. It won't stay that way. It NEVER does. The business cycle isn't going anywhere.
The biggest mistake that I saw people make during the last boom was planning as if everything would stay optimum forever. They took shortcuts, they loaded up on debt and expenses so when things took a downturn, the house of cards came falling down. If you can't be smart then you have to be tough.
Things seemed simpler in the past. Most of our parents probably worked for the same company for 30 years and retired with a pension that can sustain them for the remainder of their lives. The price that they paid was fewer choices in life. They couldn't start their own company and work out of their house. They didn't have portable pension plans that allowed them to change jobs or even careers. Many of them didn't have the opportunity to get a college education because there were not as many grant and student load programs. Given the choice, I would rather have things the way that they are now. More choices and thus more opportunity.
I still think that we will end up being better off than our parents in the long run.
Slashdot Mirror
If there is someone out there who can do exactly what I do only cheaper, who am I to complain if a customer or employer chooses them?
My job is to insure that I can provide more value than the competition. This means that I have to do something that they cannot or I have to do something that they can do only better, meaning that I have to do it faster, cheaper, or with better quality.
That's just how it works folks. Deal with it and get cracking.
Probably, but only for about 6 months until that $400 video card turns into a $200 video card and the Mobo becomes the $99 special.
God I love this business.
The sad thing is that this 1040 mile fiber link to the South Pole will probably be more reliable than the DSL link to my house.
Of course what can I expect for $50/month.
A lot has changed over the last 8 years. While you haven't been able to use computers or the Internet, I'm sure that you have been able to keep up with books and other reading.
I'm sure that there is something new that you just can't wait to get your hands on. What is it and why?
I know that the logical question is "should we?" There are bound to be some consequences that we don't understand but what better way to try to understand than to experiment?
If we proceed carefully, I think that it is unlikely that we will cause any disturbances that are more catastrophic than a volcanic eruption or other large natural event. The world always seems to recover from these events.
If we do gain more understanding and are able to tune our weather the benefits could be enormous. Imagine steering hurricanes away from population centers or directing a little rain to an area that needs it or directing it away from an area that is already flooding.
You have to pick industries and companies that are making money. While some sectors have been hit pretty hard, others are still doing ok. The slowdown also seems to be pretty regional so you may have to do a little travelling.
I have customers in several industries. I have a few that are cutting back and others that are still doing well. One of my better customers even went out of business last December. Having a diverse base helps me even things out. I simply do more work for the customers that have money right now.
I also tend to do work for large companies. Giving me a $20k PO to handle a few things isn't that big of a deal when they have a $100+ million annual project budget. Get a few of those PO's going and you are doing ok.
There are two cases where you will be hired. (1) They need to get something done quickly. Their staff could do it but there just isn't enough to go around. They need some extra help temporarily. (2) You can do something that their staff cannot. You really have to work hard to develop your skills.
I keep in touch with a lot of people and keep up with what they have going on and what they plan to do in the coming year. I'll keep up with them. I call to see if everything is going OK. Sometimes I'll get some business when they fall behind. Sometimes something comes up and they remember me because I have called in the last couple of months and they call to see if I can handle it. Sometimes they budget money for me to do future projects. It takes a while to get a pipeline going but once it does then you can keep steady work coming up and you have diversified your income so one sector or region slowing down doesn't wipe you out. Think of it as income redundancy and load balancing. It takes more to setup and manage but hey, downtime is expensive.
I guess my main point after seeing the article is that it is not all doom and gloom out there. If you are willing to take charge of things and do everything possible to insure that you can connect your services with a willing customer then you will do OK. The US economy is going faster than Europe's or Japan's. Things are not bad all over. There are down spots and up spots. If you are in a down spot then you can try to find an up spot our you can sit in your trough and hope that it perks back up eventually. I've just never been the type to sit and wait.
It can be overwhelming. It takes years to develop a good network and get your name out in your niche.
One thing to consider is that they may not be able to hire you as an employee right now but they may be able to hire you to do specific jobs. Set yourself up as a sole proprietor and make up a company. Get your city, county, state licenses as applicable and you are in business. It really doesn't need to be that big of a deal.
As you work for people, opportunities will arise. You may be offered a permanent position or you may decide that you like doing your own thing. If it pans out then you can incorporate into an S-corp or an LLC. Most people are really intimidated by the whole thing but it isn't that big of a deal. You do need an accountant to help you set up your books and help you learn the legal ropes.
The more flexible and dynamic that you can be, the better off you will be in the long run. The goal is to make it easy on the person hiring you. They should be confident that you will take care of the problem and make them look good.
I'm not saying that it is easy and it certainly takes a lot of guts to stick your butt out there the first time but like everything else, it gets easier with practice.
I'm a freelance engineer so I tend to be unemployed all of the time (everytime I finish a project). As such, I don't tend to be too sympathetic to unemployment sob stories.
Most companies are just starving for good talent. They have complex systems that they don't understand and business problems that must be solved. It is very difficult to find good people. If you can help then they are all over you.
There is all this opportunity out there but you have to find it or it has to find you. You have to network. Most technical types don't like this but you have to spend time developing the network and keeping in touch with people. By keeping in touch with people, they will think of you when they need problems solved. You also get a good idea of what people need and you can try to tailor your talents to the market's needs.
Stay flexible and be willing to take on things outside of your core abilities. You have to get in over your head every once in a while to learn. The more you do, the more you can do. It is a self perpetuating cycle.
If you are a young engineer or are in school, don't despair. Its not all doom and gloom out there. There will always be opportunity out there. You just have to work to find it.
In related stories....
The Bush administration introduced a resolution to the UN Security Council to limit access to Pringles cans and other dual-use technologies.
John Poindexter demonstrated the usefulness of his new All Watchful Eye database. By querying the database, he was able to instantly produce a list of all Iraqi's who have purchased Pringles in the last year:
"SELECT LASTNAME, FIRSTNAME FROM LISTOFEVERYONEANDEVERYTHING WHERE NATIONALITY = 'IRAQI' AND PURCHASE LIKE 'PRINLGLE'"
Tariq Aziz refuted claims that the evil Iraqi dictator starved his people to funnel money made from UN sanctioned oil sales to his weapons development by producing pictures of well fed Iraqi children being forced to eat Pringles.
Sean Penn who was previously reported to be in Iraq to protest war was actually found to be drawn to the country by a powerful case of the munchies. When confronted with this allegation, Penn responded that it was "totally bogus" and told the reporter to "stop being such a dick, dude". He then offered to help an Iraqi technician with his Pringle can claiming that his dad was a TV repairman and had an "awesome set of tools".
Get on Amazon and order a whole mess of Linksys WAP 11's. Then get a hand on as many Pringles cans as possible (Pringle can antenna article) . This is the cheapest missile defense system you can build.
They saved me from low bandwidth hell a couple of years ago. They were the first to offer broadband service to my house.
$50/month with a static IP address. Hughes spent some money when they bought Telocity. When I first got the service (Telocity days) there were a lot of dropped packets and a few problems but it was better than nothing. Over the last year, it has been great. Never goes down, fast transfers.
I guess I need to go find a new provider now. Good luck finding a static IP for $50/month. At least I write off the service as a business expense so Uncle Sam takes part of the hit as well. Serves them right for their dipshit telecom policies.
A former employer of mine had several customer billing applications running on big iron. The systems have worked for years but they wanted to be more nimble and offer more flexible billing options, etc. Newer systems would offer more flexibility.
The old systems have been around for ages. The original programers are long gone. Over the years, the business logic has become very complex and there are old artifacts in there from changes that have been made and remade. Reverse engineering all of this and deciding what is needed and what is not is not a trivial task.
In short, four years later the system is still doing the billing. Migrating to another system is going to be very costly and very error prone. It will happen eventually but not until running the old system is no longer an option. That may be a very long time. There are so many of these old systems around that there is still profit to be made in keeping them going.
Don't worry, you'll be giving that $300 back to the government this year. It was just an advance, you do owe it back on your taxes this year.
I got my check, indorsed it, deposited it, and then mailed the money back in for my quarterly tax payment. I did go out and make more money to help stimulate the economy because I'm a patriotic kind of guy.
At first they will be expensive, then they will be in the $599 desktops. Why wouldn't you use them?
It looks like the fsmlabs product has come a long way. It is really great that they make it available for free. I think that this approach has several advantages over the Steeplechase system in that you can probably do a lot more with the RTOS. The Steeplechase RTOS was limited.
Unfortunately, Steeplechase didn't make any money. There were licensing costs with the Radisys kernel and most professional controls folks were afraid for PC based control. I have to admit that I would probably limit my exposure to things like data acquisition and small controls projects. Many of the things that I work on tend to go boom or release dangerous chemicals when they fail.
The last thing that I used Steeplechase for was NASA's Payload Ground Handling Mechanism that loads payloads into the space shuttle. We used Steeplchase as a watchdog over the motion controllers. It compared operator input to the motion of the gantry and hit the kill switch if the motion controller seemed to be out of control. It worked very well in that application.
As far as cost, Steeplechase was competitive. It cost about the same to buy the I/O and software as it did to purchase a PLC.
I've done some work with Steeplechase. It worked very well. The RTOS was totally memory resident and based on the RADISYS kernel. Once it loaded, you can disconnect the hard disk and it will keep running. This increased reliability. Keep in mind that Windows would crash but the RTOS monitored it. You could program the control system to continue operation or perform an orderly shutdown in that event.
This has already been done a couple of times.
There is a software product called Steeplechase that is used for PC based control. It loads a Real Time OS first. This handles all of the control application. Windows NT/2000 is then run as a low priority process of the RTOS. It allows the control application to respond to real time constraints and products the control application from a Windows crash.
I believe that one of the Linux RTOS solutions uses a very similar approach.
I also believe that this is how the VMware GSX server product works.
HP Jornada with a CDPD modem.
Schedule, contacts, email, web, notes, time accounting, tasks, and e-books. I couldn't live without it. I'm on the road a lot and it means that I am never out of touch. It turns all of those little 5-10 minute waits during the day into productive time. Catch up on email, news, stock quotes, etc.
I also categorize my contacts. Before I visit a site, I review the names of everyone there. That way I always remember everyone's names.
My contact list has been electronic for about 7 years now. I've got thousand of entries. Even if someone's information isn't totally up to date, it has helped me many times. Last week a name came up that sounded familiar but I couldn't place it. Did a search and found that I bought some instrumentation from him in '96.
I also love the task list. As things pop up, I put them on the stack. Once you get in the habit, you don't forget to go back and take care of little details. It's nice to pull up a project and see that you have 10 outstanding items that you need to tackle.
The overall package is a lot bulkier than I would prefer and the battery life on the CDPD modem could be better but it is so useful that I put up with it. I also crave a much faster wireless connection. I have an 802.11 card that I use at home. That kind of speed everywhere and I would be in heaven.
Syncing hasn't been a problem and the Jornada has been rock solid reliable.
I would love to have a PDA with all of the capabilities that I currently have but in a Palm V form factor (with a higher res screen). I'm waiting for bluetooth PDA's and phones. I could axe the CDPD modem and just use the cell phone in my pocket. Probably next year.
One trend that this does not take into account is many families have more than one computer. How many Dad's have upgraded so that their kids could use the old computer?
I think that manufacturers saw a big surge in purchasing as many homes bought computers for the first time. Y2K was also a big reason to upgrade PC's. Now I think that most people have a PC that meets their needs with no reason to upgrade for functional reasons. The main reason to buy a computer is not to replace the old one but to have another computer in the house/office.
The only appealing use of this that I can think of right now might be to load a movie or two on the laptop prior to a plane flight.
I was hoping that this may allow you to burn a DVD or VCD from the downloaded site but no such luck. I can't think of any time that I would sit and watch a movie on my PC except when travelling.
I can't quite see how they expect to make any money off of this. To be competitive this services has to offer something better than the existing distribution channels. I see far too many bad points and only one good, no returns or late fees.
That helps but IE will insert the http://wwww and .com to anything. Thus if I type cnn and hit cntrl+enter, it will put http://www.cnn.com on the address line and bring up CNN. It is fast and I've grown pretty used to it.
I've grown used to typing 'google' and hitting ctrl + enter and having the http://www. and .com added automatically. I really miss it when using Mozilla. Is there a comparable function?
I'm glad to see this happening.
I've been pretty turned off by some of the sales practices that I have seen by large software companies. I think that it makes much more sense for governments to pool their resources and develop free software instead of licensing commercial packages.
MS licensing fees are not unreasonable but they do add up when you are talking about so many users. At least I haven't seen them selling 2 licenses for every govt employee.
A couple of years ago, an Oracle reseller sold the state of CA more licenses than they had users to use. I've seen it happen with other software companies. I'd love to see CA move to an open source database and tell Oracle to kiss their butts. It would serve them right.
I've already gotten my cease and desist letter...
The complaining party, the Interactive Digital Software Association ("IDSA"), specifically requests that you immediately cease and desist in the distribution of copyrighted software. In addition, please inform the Abuse Department of (my ISP) in writing, that the alleged activity has ceased.I think that everyone needs to realize that when you fire up a gnutella client, you are broadcasting what you have on your computer and the files that you are sharing for all to see. It doesn't take much coding to start logging who is sharing content that you own. It also doesn't take long to cross reference the IP address and find out who owns those addresses.
If you are sharing files on a gnutella client you can expect to get a cease and desist email from your ISP eventually. Many ISP's are receiving notifications from contents owners on a weekly basis. Sharing files on gnutella violates virtually every usage agreement that I have ever seen. Although the ISP's don't want to loose customers, they don't want to take the heat for being unresponsive.
I don't think that the Copyright holders are going to change their minds anytime soon. Right now it is probably much cheaper for them to hire a few coders and a few lawyers and start scaring people than it is to try to develop new business models.
I think that things will slowly change. There are already people out there trying out new business models. Some artists are also into it. Eventually someone will figure out a reliable way to make money and artists will eventually follow. I think that it is going to take years though. The establishment has things locked down pretty tight.
I have to admit that things look pretty bad right now but I am still optimistic. Life is hard, no doubt about it. You have to work your ass off and every strategy that you try is not going to be successful but I'm not willing to give up just yet.
The recession in '92 taught me some valuable lessons and this latest bust has reinforced those lessons and validated my strategies. I'm glad that these events happened while I am still relatively young.
1. Work for a company that is making money (as an employee or a businessman). If the company is not making money, find one that is. Don't wait, it will only get worse.
2. If the company isn't making money and your department isn't making the company money, your days are numbered. Get out.
3. Live lean. Keep your fixed expenses as low as possible.
4. Avoid debt at all cost for non-appreciating assets. If it is going to be worth less after you buy it, then pay cash. If you can't pay cash then do without it.
5. Use credit cards for convenience only and always pay them off every month.
6. Keep a war chest. You must have 1 year's expenses in cash if you are going to have any options in a pinch. There is nothing worse than having all of your options limited because you need a paycheck in 2 weeks to cover your rent.
7. When times are good, save your money. It won't stay that way. It NEVER does. The business cycle isn't going anywhere.
The biggest mistake that I saw people make during the last boom was planning as if everything would stay optimum forever. They took shortcuts, they loaded up on debt and expenses so when things took a downturn, the house of cards came falling down. If you can't be smart then you have to be tough.
Things seemed simpler in the past. Most of our parents probably worked for the same company for 30 years and retired with a pension that can sustain them for the remainder of their lives. The price that they paid was fewer choices in life. They couldn't start their own company and work out of their house. They didn't have portable pension plans that allowed them to change jobs or even careers. Many of them didn't have the opportunity to get a college education because there were not as many grant and student load programs. Given the choice, I would rather have things the way that they are now. More choices and thus more opportunity.
I still think that we will end up being better off than our parents in the long run.